WTO Reform: Canada and the Ottawa Group

Background

Since 1995, the WTO has played an indispensable role in facilitating rules-based international trade. To ensure its relevance in addressing new issues, it needs to be modernized.

In response, Canada is leading a group of 14 likeminded WTO Members, known as the Ottawa Group (Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, European Union, Japan, Kenya, South Korea, Mexico, New Zealand, Norway, Singapore, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom), in order to help WTO Members address specific challenges that are putting the multilateral trading system under stress.

The objective of this bottom-up process is to contribute ideas and analysis towards achieving meaningful, realistic, and pragmatic reforms to the WTO over the short, medium, and long term.

Since its establishment in 2018, discussions of the Ottawa Group have focused on:

• reinvigorating the negotiating function, including how development considerations can be best pursued in rule-making efforts
• strengthening the deliberative function of the WTO, including the way in which WTO councils and committees operate
• focusing on safeguarding and strengthening the dispute-settlement mechanism

Initiatives

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Ottawa Group agreed to a joint statement outlining six concrete actions that the group would take. This included:

• supporting efforts to advance the e-commerce joint statement initiative
• examining potential ways the WTO could facilitate access to medical supplies
• enhancing engagement with stakeholders

On November 23, 2020, Ottawa Group members unanimously endorsed a Trade and Health Initiative, which was presented to the WTO General Council in December 2020. Under the Initiative, Canada and the Ottawa Group called for further cooperation among all WTO Members to strengthen global supply chains and facilitate the flow of essential medical goods, including vaccines, amid the pandemic.

At the 12th Ministerial Conference (MC12) in 2022, the Ottawa Group issued a Ministerial Statement on WTO reform that:

1. reaffirmed its commitment to multilateralism and rules-based trade with the WTO at its centre;
2. advanced work to improve the WTO’s monitoring and deliberative functions;
3. supported the strengthening of the WTO’s negotiating function to address the economic and trade realities of the 21st century; and
4. engaged constructively towards finding a multilateral solution to the Appellate Body (AB) impasse.

At the 13th Ministerial Conference (MC13) in 2024, the Ottawa Group supported work on key issues, including on dispute settlement, fisheries subsidies, reform, trade and industrial policy, and e-commerce. During MC13, Canada hosted two ministerial-level Ottawa Group meetings on February 25 and February 29, 2024, to enhance coordination on advancing shared priorities.

Ottawa Group ministerial meetings

Contact

If you have questions or comments about this initiative, we would like to hear from you. Please contact Global Affairs Canada at:

Trade Policy and Negotiations Division (TCW)
Global Affairs Canada
Lester B. Pearson Building
125 Sussex Drive
Ottawa, Ontario, K1A 0G2

Fax: 613-944-0757
Email: consultations@international.gc.ca